Conservative ADSCAM...But, Who Will the NDP Attack

The real issue that comes to rise here is that the Conservatives knowingly tried to bilk Canadian taxpayers by asking for rebates on the $1.3 million in advertising expenses by the 67 ridings in question. Some of us knew this would blow up sooner or later waaaay far back in October.

A couple of questions run through my head though. 1. What will Mike Duffy do to spin this in a good light for the Conservatives? 2. How will Chantal Hebert blame this on Dion? And, 3. How vicious will Tom Mulcair be in blaming the Liberals for this?

leftdog.... thanks for beating me to the punch there with all those examples.

But just to ad to that point, just because the Cons now have Conadscam (borrowed from Accidental Deliberations), doesn't mean that the Liberals past in Adscam, which as the arrest of Mr. Corbeil on Friday shows us, is still being investigated by the RCMP, all of a sudden goes away and evapourates.

Honestly, what really bothers me here is that I am find that some Liberal friends of mine are treating Conadscam like some kind of a silver bullet to get them back into office, not as a sign of problems of corruption in the Canadian politics. If the Liberals were really interested in getting to the root of this problem, they would be coming out and a) admitting to their own mistakes and giving concrete ideas and policy to correct and avoid such things from happening again and b) approaching Conadscam with a little less "glee" (sorry, that's the best description I could come up with) and treat this whole situation with a little more gravitas and alike.

The state of Canadian politics is not good right now, and it doesn't require ambulance chasing right now. It requires solutions.

BTW... i'm not saying this to trying to paint the Libs are corrupt and such (although if past history has taught me anything, I would expect that accusation to come back at me), i'm saying this out of concern for the entire democratic process. The only way to solve these problems is to admit to what everyone is doing wrong, and work towards fixing it. This is not a time to score partisan points, it's a time for some self-reflection.

It appears to me the liberals tried to do exactly what you suggest. They called an Inquiry and then committed to implementing the recommendations - many of which have not been implemented by the cons. They have attempted to look into Cadman, only to have the NDP block it. They have been trying to shine the spotlight on the government while the NDP have been trying to shine it on the liberals.

By the way, one of M.Corbeil's alleged victims was the Liberal Party of Canada. If you choose to take the high road here then it is incumbent on you to mention that, rather than focus on the liberals' past in Adscam.

Gayle... two points, ones that I find myself having to repeat a lot. First of all, with Cadman, the NDP has argued that it's the RCMP who should have the first crack at it, as they actually have all the investigative powers in place to do something about this, not a House Committee.

Second point, M. Corbeil faces serveral charges, including influence peddling, in which he is alleged to have offered government contracts for donations to the Liberal Party. In that case, he was not defrauding the Liberal Party.

Either way, just for your information, pointing to Liberal corruption doesn't mean "focusing" on the Liberals. Both the Cons and the Liberals have their hands dirty here, and those are facts at this point. So if you're going to take on the corruption, you've got to talk about everyone who has taken part in it. Sorry Gayle, but what you're saying is sounding a lot like the Cons saying that Elections Canada is "picking" on them. That's not meant as attack, just as an observation.

It was Paul Martin, a Liberal that called for Gommery. iT WAS ADVERTISING EXECS that bilked the Canadian taxpayer and the Liberal Party of Canada, as well as bureaucrats like Guite. Not one Liberal MP has been guilty of anything. Corbeil was an "organizer" in the early freakin' 90's. He's being charged as part of an advertising firm. Not as a Liberal.

And, the Conservatives have yet another adscam on the horizon that most of the MSM hasn't caught onto yet.

"Corbeil was an "organizer" in the early freakin' 90's. He's being charged as part of an advertising firm. Not as a Liberal."

I didn't know that being a Liberals was officially a crime. He was charged for actions that he did while with the Liberal Party, and involving his involvements with the Liberal Party, but somehow that doesn't link up to the Liberal Party??? Sorry, but that sounds a lot like the Cons "Elections Canada is picking on me" argument.

I'll give you the point that Martin did go ahead with Gomery, which took some guts, where that's about where it ended.

Honestly James, do you honestly believe that we should just ignore the misdeeds of the Liberals and ignore what possible mistakes that we could learn from there, and only focus on the misdeeds of the Conseratives? My concern in this is not poll numbers, it's the legitimacy of the entire democratic process. And I'm sorry, but if we are going to selectively cherry pick scandals and parties to look and not look at, then nothing is going to get solved and it will all be looked upon with great suspicion.

James.... the NDP is attacking everyone who is facing these corruption problems. They are opposing all of those who they feel are a part of the problem right now, and sorry to say it, but that does include the Liberals. What do you honestly expect the NDP to do? Just ignore the Liberals, their past, their ideas and their policies all together???

James... read my blog and my recent posts... My attacks are Conservative-centric.... If even mentioning the word "Liberal" constitutes focusing on them, then I respectfully suggest that you re-evaluate the meaning of the word.

And by the way, calling an inquiry is one thing, but acting after the fact is another. What things has your party done internally to avoid Adscam from being repeated??? What actions have the Liberals taken since the inquiry?

Um. We were booted out of office. We paid the price for our indescretions. It is up to the Conservatives to introduce legislature based on Gomery after the fact. They are the governing party and Gomery wasn't over until after their election.

"...do you honestly believe that we should just ignore the misdeeds of the Liberals and ignore what possible mistakes that we could learn from there, and only focus on the misdeeds of the Conseratives?"

Again - that is why Martin called an inquiry, so please stop asserting the liberals have done nothing to try and resolve this issue. I have yet to hear any liberal deny Adscam was a serious breach of the public trust.

But hey, while we are looking into these things, why don't we look into scams like the NDP claiming a liberal candidate tried to bribe them. Seems corruption knows no party affiliation...

As for Cadscam, yes I am well aware of the excuse the NDP used to prevent the committee from looking into it. I am also aware they did not think the same excuse applied to the committee hearings into Adscam.

Frankly, it is a stupid excuse. We have never even received confirmation the RCMP will investigate. Criminal charges are highly unlikely because they would be almost impossible to prove. The only real way to look into this is through a parliamentary committee, but as we know the NDP are worried about that because it might give the liberals some traction.

(By the way, I vote NDP, in case you think this is just me being a partisan liberal)

James... fair enough for now... but I would gather from your answer that the Liberals haven't made any internal changes to prevent a future Adscam from happening...

If the Liberals had made some internal changes, at least the Liberals could point to those changes as not only actions that they have taken to avoid it, and sends the message that they really have learned their lesson. Wouldn't you agree that the Liberals would benefit from doing that?

Gayle... again, two points. First of all, when it cames to the case of the NDP candidate making those allegations against the Liberals, they made an official apology in the House of Commons, and also made changes to internal policies to ensure that dosn't happen again. They admitted to their mistake, and then too actions to not just find out what happened, but also to correct the problem.

Second, as for Adscam, charges had already been laid before the House of Commons got their hands on Adscam, therefore the proper channels were followed.

And by the way, if the RCMP doesn't investigate Cadman, the NDP will support bringing it back. They've never argued that the House shouldn't look at it under any circumstances, they argued that the RCMP should go first. And frankly, if the whole Cadman thing is as bad as everyone believes it is, there should be criminal charges to be found by an RCMP investigation. Personally, i've never bought this argument that the Cadman affair was such an afront to democracy and so bad, with crimes being broken and such, but we shouldn't wait for the police to actually lay charges. It has nothing to do with giving Liberals traction, it has to do with doing what's right, and what some people don't like to accept is that sometimes that doesn't line up with what would be best for the Liberals (by the way Gayle, I try not to assume any biases. I do appreciate your comments)

Ah yes, the sanctimonious NDP - the only reason they haven't had a federal scam is because they've never been federal government, but hey, that didn't stop them from scams provinciallly - Spudscam, O'Learygate and Bingogate to name a few.

There comes a time when you have to move forward folks - otherwise we'd still be ranting about Sir. John A. MacDonald - who was the true most corrupt politican in Canada - shall we go on about it.

Rural Sandi... So I guess you're suggesting that we just ignore things that happened just a handful of years ago (and still being investigated). Ignoring it doesn't help to correct it. My point is fixing the system so that things like this don't happen. If that somehow makes me scanctimonious, then so be it, but at least I'm not willing to ignore whatever scandals the NDP might have had in the past. That's why I believe that every party needs to have this self-reflection.

Oh, Northwestern Lad, give your head a shake. I'm not ignoring it. In fact, I was very angry, but it has to be put in the right perspective - it's out in the open, had a hearing and investigations finishing up - how much more can you go on about it -using it for political points instead of some decent policies as a good alternative for government isn't good enough.

Spin and spin all you want - the fact remains that the Liberals have many new people, none were involved.

OK - this thread seems to be focussed on the tension between the NDP/Cons/Libs with some actual discussion (instead of only name calling) so here is a question I asked on Garth's blog: Compare the party standings to spending on ten-percenters:

RuralSandi... my head needs no shaking... what is the value of getting something out in the open, pointing out what's wrong with it, but then doing nothing to solve it? What's the point of going through the pain of the first two points without actually putting changes in place to fix this?

I am not trying to spin a thing, as spinning is not a part of my repetoire. But I must call you on one thing, did every single MP, Senator and Member of the Liberal Party who was involved during the time of sponsorship gone??? Funny, I thought I still saw a lot of them in the Opposition benches (when they show) and on TV. I'm sorry, but many of those people may not have been pulling the leavers, but many saw things going on and didn't say anything. Being a by-stander doesn't make you completely innocent. But like I said before, if the Liberal Party had actually made some changes to their internal policies and procedures, I could believe that the Party has learned from this.

Northern... the NDP spent the least, so are they really the worst??? That's debatable. Either way, I have no issue in opening the whole practice up for review and fixing it. A problem is a problem is a problem, regardless of who is doing it.

there is an arcane history behind the 10%ers - apparently they were meant to advise voters about riding-boundary shifts, sort-of partisan/informative purpose -hence the nick-name - they can send out-of-riding mail equal to 10% of their constituents